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TL;DR
In a hurry? Here's our pick of the top news items of the week.
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A record 17.4M Americans are expected to have traveled over Labor Day weekend, marking the busiest Labor Day in 15 years. (Skift)
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The WNBA has already broken its single-season attendance record, with 2.5M fans attending 226 games so far this season. (Ticketing Business)
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Microsoft’s AI division announced its first homegrown AI models, MAI-Voice-1 AI and MAI-1-preview, which are expected to compete with GPT-5 and DeepSeek. (The Verge)
Audiences
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53% of US consumers cited a lack of human empathy and understanding as a concern when using GenAI-powered customer service tools. (Emarketer)
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38% of US consumers have used GenAI for shopping, and another 52% plan to do so this year. (Emarketer)
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In July, lower-income households in the US spent 8% less than the national average on streaming services, while higher-income groups spent 9% more. (AInvest)
Platforms
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Meta announced a new partnership with Midjourney as it seeks to improve its visual generation tools. (Social Media Today)
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TikTok’s operations in the UK, Europe, and Latin America more than doubled revenue since 2022. (Social Media Today)
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Instagram is adding a new “Campus Verification” option to provide a means for college students to connect in the app. (Social Media Today)
Content
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Amazon Ads is officially launching in New Zealand with the introduction of Prime Video advertising. (Adobo Magazine)
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YouTube hit six consecutive months as the top TV distributor in the US, accounting for 13.4% of all TV use for the month of July. (THR)
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Warner Bros. Pictures’ "Weapons" looks to return to the top of the box office with almost $15M in fourth-weekend ticket sales. (Media Play News)
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Netflix accounted for 90% of the top 10 most-streamed content the first week of August, led by Adam Sandler’s "Happy Gilmore 2." (Media Play News)
Tech &
AI-
According to Pew Research Center, only 8% of Google searches with AI summaries lead to a traditional link click, nearly half the rate of pages without summaries (15%). (Emarketer)
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Anthropic launched a research preview of Claude for Chrome, a browser-based AI agent powered by its Claude AI models. (Tech Crunch)
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Google rolled out a new AI-powered experimental feature in Google Translate designed to help people practice and learn a new language. (Tech Crunch)
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Anthropic announced it will start training its AI models on user data, including chat transcripts and coding sessions. (The Verge)
Location-based
entertainment-
Netflix set opening dates for its new Netflix House immersive entertainment venues in Texas and Pennsylvania for later this year. (Blooloop)
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US artist Ariana Grande announced her first tour in seven years next summer with 27 dates in North America and the UK. (Ticketing Business)
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One in four late-night venues have closed their doors in the UK since 2020, according to data released by the NTIA. (Ticketing Business)
Travel &
hospitality-
Reflecting surging demand, Japan’s largest two airlines are planning to more than double their capacity on two Australian routes. (Karryon)
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Short-term rental occupancy rates are pacing 10% below 2024 levels in every US state. (Travel Agent Central)
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Trip.com unveiled an AI-powered trip planner that builds editable, bookable itineraries from just a few inputs or an image. (Skift)
Gaming
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Attendance for Gamescom 2025 broke records last week, increasing 6.5% to 357K visitors from 128 countries. (gamesindustry.biz)
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Digital purchases made up 90% of European gaming revenue in 2024. (gamesindustry.biz)
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Atari acquired the IP rights to five Ubisoft games, with plans to reintroduce them by bringing them to new platforms. (gamesindustry.biz)
